Israeli Films at TIFF: Eran Riklis and Avi Nesher Confirmed, Precious Life Hitting Fest and then HBO

As predicted in last week’s post, both Eran Riklis (North American preem for The Human Resources Manager) and Avi Nesher were confirmed last Tuesday for TIFF’s Contemporary World Cinema program — Nesher’s International Premiere goes by a different title now, and will know be known as The Matchmaker.

Riklis’ film (pic above) is a tragi-comedy centered on the HR manager of Israel’s largest industrial bakery, who sets out to save the reputation of his business and prevent the publication of a defamatory article. Nesher’s portrait (see below) is set in 1968 Haifa, a teenage boy gets a summer job with a Holocaust survivor who makes ends meet by brokering marriages and smuggling goods. Throughout the summer, the mysterious matchmaker takes the boy on a dangerous coming of age …

Another film that is in the Toronto line-up is Precious Life. This week it was announced that HBO has acquired the documentary, and is planning a theatrical release towards the end of September, making it eligible for the Oscar race. And with A Film Unfinished having just been sown theatrically (gathering an impressive 8500$ per-screen average in his first weekend, and with plans to widen the release), it looks like at least one Israeli documentary has a chance at making an Oscar nom bid. And speaking of awards…

A date for the Ophir ceremony has finally been set, and it will take place on Sep 21st in Jerusalem. As the documentary race is getting hotter everyday, and A Film Unfinished and Precious Life are running head to head, the fiction film race is opening up. The favorite to win is still Nir Bergman’s Intimate Grammar, but an anonymous survey amongst Academy members reveals that all five nominees are all in a dead heat — with only a few votes separating the films. According to the rules of the Israeli Academy, the winner of the best picture Ophir will also be the film representing Israel in the Foreign Language Oscar – so things are pretty hot in this section as well.